Philippine Stew

Simmering in the Pacific like a panful of jumping beans, the Phil- ippine Islands are a cause for constant concern to the President and his Secretary for War. The S. S. President Grant lately nosed into Manila (TIME, July 19), bearing Businessman Carmi A. Thompson of Ohio, representative extraordinary of "Big White President Coolidge." Not a day since but the President and War Secretary Dwight Filley Davis have followed Businessman Thompson's moves with watchful, hopeful eyes. Last week they saw that:

Plebiscite? The Administration, mindful of its recent failure to put through a plebiscite in Tacna-Arica, (TIME, June 21, LATIN AMERICA et ante), probably desires nothing less than to have the Philippine legislature win its long fight to secure a plebiscite on Philippine independence.

Last week, however, the plebiscite battle entered an ugly stage when the Philippine Senate passed its plebiscite bill for a second time. At once President Manuel Quezon of the Senate demanded that the bill be transmitted for approval or veto to President Coolidge--a procedure which would floodlight the Philippine question with unwelcome world-publicity. All Manila buzzed with uncertainty as to whether Leonard Wood or Calvin Coolidge would be called upon to deal with the measure.

Governor General Wood vetoed it last year. Had the then sitting legislature repassed it over his veto it would have gone automatically to the President. But the legislature rose without repassing the bill, allowed it to expire. Hence the bill voted last week is technically a "new bill," may have to be vetoed and repassed again before it gets to Washington. President Quezon of the Senate, mindful of this contra temps, launched an elaborate quibble, last week, contended that "the present session of the legislature is only an extension of the session of last year."

Aboard the Bustamente. The President's augustly deputed repre- sentative, Colonel Carmi A. Thompson of Ohio, boarded the squat, nondescript cable-laying ship Bustamente last week and bobbed out to the island province of Mindoro, the "Isle of Gold."

There Colonel Thompson and his party were welcomed by a swift tropical downpour, jounced over cobbles to the residence of Governor Navarro, and were informed by him through an interpreter that Filipinos desire immediate independence.

The Colonel, dauntlessly tactful, continued as soon as courtesy al- lowed to the Municipal High School and there declared: "I think the outstanding characteristic of the Filipinos is their desire for educa- tion, amounting almost to a passion."

Moved by the Colonel's words a villager rushed toward him with a broad bladed Filipino bolo, cried: "Me speak good English! You take this all quick!" Colonel Thompson, grateful, accepted the bolo.

At Los Banos, the next stop, Colonel Thompson tasted dubiously then smacked his lips over a sweet sluggish liquid. "This," he said, "is the greatest discovery I have yet made in the Philippines!"

Dr. Manuel Roxas, speaker of the Philippine House, deft chemist, explained delightedly how he has worked out at the University of the Philippines in Los Banos a secret process for producing a sugary syrup and then sugar from the nipa palm. Allegedly this now secret process may revolutionize the sugar industry, cause nipa palms to spring up in place of sugar cane or sugar beets.

Continuing to Calamba, Colonel Thompson heard tiny tots recite ensemble in "English" a poem which he finally recognized as Little Boy Blue.

Bacon. Representative Robert L. Bacon of New York admitted lo- quaciously to pressmen last week that he is now drafting for pres- entation to the House next fall, the Bacon bill, an act designed to curb the Philippine Senate in its efforts to encroach upon the author- ity of the Governor General.